Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are! – A Review of “Other Mommy”

After her bedtime story reaches its end and her dad wishes her “night night,” Isabela summons her mom’s doppelgänger, “other mommy,” to stretch playtime. It is a poltergeist. It can assume the body of any human; it can shed its human skin; it can flip an entire room upside down; its true form is of a squat alien with flashing …

A Master at Manipulating the Truth – A Review of “Verity”

The Montrose Playhouse is five years old. The audience picked “Jaws,” “Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King,” “I Swear,” “Forrest Gump,” and “Highlander” to celebrate. “In the town where I grew up,” says Lowen, one of two female writers in “Verity” (Metro Goldwyn Mayer), also showing now at the Montrose Playhouse, “everyone knew everything about everyone.” Everybody …

Suck it Nature – A Review of “Digger”

Digger Rockwell is a cranky Texan billionaire who spends his days telling everyone how great he is. “Listen to me carefully,” he likes to say. One big dramatic event a third of the way through “Digger” (Warner Bros.), showing now at the Montrose Playhouse, flips the sense of the whole film. It is wild and clever. I won’t reveal what …

Sick with Refinement – A Review of “Sense and Sensibility”

When I was eight or nine or maybe ten years old and visiting my grandmother, she would hold back lunch until my father and grandfather returned from their pre-prandial pint “round the corner.” The delay made no difference; she was a terrible cook. There was a front window from which it was possible almost to look down the pavement, which …

The Prepper and his Dog – A Review of “Heart of the Beast”

In the early twenty-tens, I was a fan of “Ultimate Survival Alaska,” an HBO television series which comprised thirty-seven taut, testosterone-propelled episodes. I still think about it now and then. “Ultimate Survival” is a classical Alaska wilderness adventure: it has a cast of men, it is outdoorsy, it is a competition, it proceeds by ticking off pre-set tasks, and it …

Single-Player Game – A Review of “Resident Evil”

PlayStation, owned by the Sony Corporation, hawks its “Resident Evil” wares on the ample market-stall of Columbia Pictures, owned by the Sony Corporation. As the credits wrapped up, a group of young men familiar with “Resident Evil,” the game, stopped on the Screen Three stairs to chat. Was I reviewing the game or just the movie? Just the movie, I …

Queen of the Class – A Review of “Bad Apples”

“Miss,” one of Maria Spencer’s primary-school pupils says, “my mum says you’re incompetent.” Panicked by the next day’s inspectors’ visit, Miss Spencer kidnaps the naughtiest little boy in her class and locks him in her basement. The inspection over, she mutters a few drafts of a text to the boy’s father: “I have your son in my basement”; “Will you …

It’s the Data, Stupid – A Review of “Pressure”

Failure to control our behaviour destroys our weather. The impact of this failure will be surveyed in Montrose (at the LandxSea environmental-film festival) this weekend. But failure to forecast the weather also destroys military plans. Military disaster is rendered in a compact prelude to “Pressure” (StudioCanal), showing now at the Montrose Playhouse. A coastline, shot from an arriving boat. The …

Riding Through the Glen – A Review of “The Death of Robin Hood”

Robin Hood was an amiable communist who was a safe bet for ITV at quarter past five on a Saturday afternoon. In the eighties he was played by family-friendly Jason Connery; his catchy rhyme has been sung by children for decades: Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the GlenRobin Hood, Robin Hood, with his band of menFeared by the bad, …

Open Wide! – A Review of “Insidious: Out of the Further”

Visits to my dentist in Castle Street, Forfar, require me to take two buses in each direction. The journey is long and pleasant, especially the view of the valley from upstairs on a double-decker bus on the route via Aberlemno. In the dentist’s surgery there is a small waiting room with approximately ten chairs and a television that loops before-and-after …

I’ll Be There for You – A Review of “Spa Weekend”

When I feel my age wearing me down, or the exhalations of the newspaper worrying me, a breezy comedy makes me feel better. Movies like “Spa Weekend” (Black Bear), showing now at the Montrose Playhouse, are here to stay. They deliver the “Friends”-like vibe promised by the cinematic poster; they cherry-pick a specific fantasy reachable for many; they stick to …

Lobster Thermidor – A Review of “Tony”

Never eat fish on a Monday if it’s dowsed in a spicy sauce. Chef Anthony Bourdain is famous for his best-seller “Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly,” in which he guts the sharp practices of high-end fish restaurants. “Tony”(A24), showing now at the Montrose Playhouse, portrays him as a college-age drifter; the hazy summer it sketches has been “fictionalised …